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In Episode Six, we beagle about Alfred’s new novella, A Push of the Pendulum. The novella opens as its reluctant hero, Julian Drake, is dislocated – emotionally, because his parents are divorcing and selling his childhood home, but also physically, as they have enrolled him in boarding school – St. Eligius Episcopal School, to be precise. The novella traces Julian’s process as he adjusts to boarding school, learns to use an enchanted clock, saves the school from the evil intentions of trustee Stryker, and, yes, finds place and home in his universe.
Alfred talks in this episode about influences from earlier fantasy writers (think John Bellairs, not J.K. Rowling) to thinkers, especially the neo-Platanists. He also talks about the human need to transcend the self and find connection – or home – in the universe, themes in the novella. And then there’s the tension between idea and story – Alfred’s background in theology and Hannah’s in literature make for some lively discussion in this area.
An avid reader of fantasy literature since childhood, Alfred embarked on the project of writing his own fantasy story partially from frustration. He wanted to show that it’s possible for magic to make sense in a story – to create an internally and metaphysically consistent representation of magic in a fantasy novel. Alfred argues that he has done just this in A Push of the Pendulum.